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Summary: Part 4, Section 1

From the trip into the city to Klara's discovery about Mr Capaldi's work

The Mother drives Rick, Miss Helen, Josie, and Klara into town—Josie has her appointment with Mr Capaldi, and Rick and Miss Helen have a meeting with Miss Helen’s “secret weapon,” an old flame of hers who she thinks can help Rick get into college. They are staying at a friend’s apartment, and Josie’s father arrives beforehand to accompany her to the appointment. Klara sees that things are tense between the Father and the Mother, and she is split between paying attention to the family and also keeping an eye out for the Cootings Machine, which she plans to destroy during this trip. 

Josie is extremely excited upon seeing her father, and all four of them set off to Mr Capaldi’s while Rick and Miss Helen go off on their own, planning to all meet up for dinner. On the way to Mr Capaldi’s, the Mother and Father argue over their respective life paths—the Father questions the Mother’s dedication to her job, and the Mother doubts that the Father is happy having lost his a while back. They pass by the location of Klara’s old store to find that it has been replaced, but Klara is delighted to glimpse the Cootings Machine nearby.

From the moment they arrive at Mr Capaldi’s office, it is clear that the Father does not like Mr Capaldi and takes issue with the portrait he is making of Josie. The Mother asks to see the work Mr Capaldi has done so far and he agrees, though he refuses to let Josie see it. The Mother returns from seeing the portrait looking dejected and strange. Before getting to work, Mr Capaldi asks Klara to participate in a test designed to collect data on AFs. She agrees, and he sets her up in a room near the one containing the portrait. Klara finds the questions in the test are easy enough to hardly pay attention to. Through the frosted glass on the door, she sees the Father go into the portrait room and come out looking ill. Still participating in the test, Klara pushes open her own door to listen to the others talk downstairs. The Father is getting upset, challenging Mr Capaldi, and Klara’s curiosity over the portrait is piqued. She goes into the portrait room to find a partially finished, life-size model of Josie hung in the air. She realizes that the Mother has commissioned Mr Capaldi to create an AF version of Josie.

Klara retreats from the room and finds the Mother yelling at the Father for being against Mr Capaldi’s work from the beginning. The Father is angry; he leaves, taking Josie with him. Mr Capaldi tries to comfort the Mother and reassure her that what he’s doing is a good thing. She sees Klara and tells her to come over to them; the Mother asks Klara what she thinks, and Klara says she suspected the portrait was actually an AF, and that it looks very accurate. The Mother reveals that she had tried this once before with Sal, and Mr Capaldi reminds her that Sal’s version was just a bereavement doll rather than a full AF. He states that this AF won’t be a copy of Josie, but a continuation of her. Klara tries to reassure the Mother by saying Josie might not die, but that if she does, Klara will train the new AF to be just like Josie. Mr Capaldi tells Klara that they don’t just want her to train the AF, they want Klara to become Josie herself. The test Klara took earlier was to determine how well she really knows Josie, and figure out what more she needs to work on in order to fully inhabit the child. 

Read more about Klara’s discovery of the true nature of Mr Capaldi’s work.

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